[
Lists Home |
Date Index |
Thread Index
]
An answer I've seen more than once is that private operations
and specs increase the value of consortia to their members
by ensuring that members do have information before non-members,
so in that respect, yes it is a way to keep funds coming in. In
this, it works like the Augusta golf group that hosts the Masters.
Exclusive clubs do very well.
But the Masters isn't really a publicly owned event. It is a
private event open to the public. Is the web is a public utility
or a class of private services? Careful how you answer that.
Call the works recommendations or specifications, and that is honest.
That is what the W3C says by policy, even if their members and
representatives say otherwise for quotation.
In so far as protecting private information from competitors,
it doesn't do that nor does it keep things out of the press.
That is not to say it doesn't do work of value. One has to
ask from point to point, cui bono? The answer is not always
the same. I don't think the secrecy oaths do them as
much good as they think. It might be a strategy to
restrain the impulsive among them. It's a strategy many
organizations share.
len
-----Original Message-----
From: Simon St.Laurent [mailto:simonstl@simonstl.com]
Sent: Saturday, June 21, 2003 8:20 PM
To: xml-dev@lists.xml.org
Subject: Re: [xml-dev] xPath 2.0, XSLT 2.0 ... size increase over v1.0
AndrewWatt2000@aol.com writes:
>I suspect that at least one aspect of the answer to the question of
>why a private consortium is fairly straightforward - to provide a
>funding mechanism.
Sure - but the W3C also claims, at least in its PR - a rather important
public mission. Finding the balance between the public and private is
difficult, and I think Len pointed out how unbalanced the situation
appears to be for this particular aspect of W3C process.
It's hardly like the W3C keeps its specs private to gather more funding,
remember.
--
Simon St.Laurent
Ring around the content, a pocket full of brackets
Errors, errors, all fall down!
http://simonstl.com -- http://monasticxml.org
-----------------------------------------------------------------
The xml-dev list is sponsored by XML.org <http://www.xml.org>, an
initiative of OASIS <http://www.oasis-open.org>
The list archives are at http://lists.xml.org/archives/xml-dev/
To subscribe or unsubscribe from this list use the subscription
manager: <http://lists.xml.org/ob/adm.pl>
|
